FIRST QUARTER 2005 VOLUME 12 NUMBER 1 - arias·us

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in focus Bina T. Dagar Western New England College School of Law; and a Master of Laws in Taxation from Boston University. Mr. Craft is also admitted to the Connecticut Bar, the New York Bar and the Massachusetts Bar; and the United States Tax Court. He is a member of ARIAS UK. Cathryn A. Curia Cathryn Curia has more than 34 years of experience in insurance and reinsurance property underwriting, giving her an indepth knowledge of ceded reinsurance operations, as well as assumed reinsurance practices. Ms. Curia began her insurance career with Atlantic Mutual Insurance Company as a trainee in 1969. After an intensive training program, she was assigned to the New York Personal Lines Underwriting operation. In 1971, she moved to the Ceded Reinsurance Department as a supervisor and assistant to the head of Ceded Reinsurance. While at Atlantic, she developed through levels of management, ultimately handling the planning, negotiation, purchase and implementation of reinsurance for the organization for property, casualty and marine lines of business. She attended Robert Strain’s first Reinsurance Seminar in 1973 and obtained her CPCU in 1978 and her ARM in 1981. In July 1983, Ms. Curia joined St. Paul Re as Assistant Vice-President in the North American Property Treaty Department. During the next 19 years, she took on increasing underwriting, management, client relationship and leadership responsibilities, resulting in her being appointed Executive Vice-President North American Treaty in November 2001. Ms. Curia has extensive experience in property underwriting audits, as well as crossfunctional team involvement. She led the company’s education programs for its employees for 15 years. In November 2002, St. Paul Companies spunoff St. Paul Re via an IPO as Platinum Underwriters Reinsurance Inc. Ms. Curia served as Executive Vice-President North American Treaty in the new company until September 2003. Ms. Curia is a graduate of The College of Notre Dame of Maryland and has taken multiple courses at The College of Insurance. P A G E 2 4 She has participated in several AMA Management courses, as well as a St. Paul Companies advanced leadership program. She is a member of the Society of CPCU and is a member and past president of the Association of Professional Insurance Women. Bina T. Dagar Bina Dagar is a reinsurance consultant. She offers her services through Ameya Consulting, LLC, a reinsurance consulting firm she founded in July 2004. Her services include reinsurance analysis and strategic planning, expert testimony, and insurance and reinsurance arbitration/mediation in the property and casualty field. Ms. Dagar has over 20 years of experience working in management, technical and consulting capacities for insurance and reinsurance companies. She is an experienced reinsurance executive with expertise in underwriting, claims and marketing, including specialized areas such as Political Risk and Export Credit, Kidnap and Extortion and Professional Liability. Ms. Dagar served as Vice President - International Division for Everest Reinsurance Company in New Jersey, from 1996 to 2001, and Director - Domestic and Multi-Line Underwriting, from 1994 to 1996. In these positions, she managed the technical responsibilities, strategic planning, and budgeting of various geographic regions; managed business and professional relationships with clients and reinsurance brokers; and marketed prospective clients and regions. Prior to 1994, Ms. Dagar managed a varied portfolio of brokered and direct business - both domestic and international - at SCOR. She maintained responsibility for underwriting, planning, developing and auditing ceding companies and retrocedants in addition to overseeing SCOR’s Political Risk MGA. Prior to that, Ms. Dagar served variously as Manager of Ceded Reinsurance at CIGNA International and Management Consultant at CIGNA Systems from 1984 to 1989. As Manager, she designed and priced reinsurance structures for affiliated companies worldwide and oversaw $13 million in reinsurance recoveries on Casualty, Political Risk and Export Credit runoff
2 5 P A G E business. As Consultant, she provided staffing, management and production consulting services to CIGNA’s worldwide subsidiaries. She was also chosen to participate on a blue ribbon committee assigned to cost and price business produced worldwide. Ms. Dagar is a magna cum laude graduate of the University of Pennsylvania with a double major in Liberal Arts and South Asian Studies. She is a member of the Association of Professional Insurance Women (APIW) and is serving on a number of committees for that organization. She has authored articles on reinsurance and has served as a speaker at panel discussions on reinsurance arbitrations. Joseph J. DeVito Joseph DeVito is the President of DeVito Consulting, Inc., a consulting firm he established in 1989, dedicated to providing expert services to the insurance industry. He focuses his expertise in regulatory and litigation support, rehabilitations and liquidations, insurance and reinsurance runoffs, accounting and financial matters, operations, and taxation. Mr. DeVito is presently assisting various State Insurance Departments in support of litigation and expert witness matters and/or forensic accounting assistance. Throughout his thirty-six year career, Mr. DeVito has been involved in many facets of the insurance industry. Prior to establishing DeVito Consulting, Inc., he was President and Chief Executive Officer of GFN Corporation and its subsidiaries. GFN’s primary asset was a property and casualty insurer writing specialty products in the southeast. While at GFN, Mr. DeVito established a variety of service entities to assist in the daily operations, as well as to provide expert services to third parties. These entities included a reinsurance intermediary, an insurance agency, a claims management firm, a judicial investigative company, and a consulting firm. Mr. DeVito was a partner at KPMG Peat Marwick Insurance Practice in New York, specializing in insurance and reinsurance companies and acting as liaison with the firm’s mergers and acquisitions department. Following completion of an acquisition for a foreign financial conglomerate, he became President and Chief Executive Officer of GFN. He was actively involved in developing and conducting KPMG’s insurance training seminars, was responsible for all KPMG professional staff training, and enjoyed many years as an instructor of a major CPA review course, an adjunct professor at the College of Insurance, and as an instructor of seminars conducted for state regulators. Mr. DeVito is a Certified Public Accountant and holds a Master’s Degree in Executive Management, a Bachelor’s Degree in Accounting, and is recognized as a qualified actuary in the State of New York. He is a member of the Board of Directors of IAIR since 2003 and currently holds the position of 1st Vice President, Treasurer, and President Elect. Grandsons Liam Joseph and Brendan join their proud parents Joy (nee DeVito) and Liam Sargent, Uncle [and Dr.] Marc DeVito, and Uncle Keith DeVito and his new wife Lisa. Mr. DeVito’s wife, Susan, and he are thrilled with the new additions to the family and look forward to a growing family tree. John S. Diaconis As both in-house and outside counsel, Mr. Diaconis has over twenty-four years of insurance and reinsurance claims experience in commercial crime, financial institution bonds, insurance company errors and omissions, directors and officers, and professional liability Claims. He has been involved as counsel, arbitrator and mediator in numerous commercial, insurance and reinsurance arbitrations and disputes, involving both facultative and treaty reinsurance contracts as well as primary and excess insurance policies. Currently, he focuses on serving as party-appointed arbitrator and mediator in insurance and reinsurance arbitrations. In addition to his arbitration and mediation practice, Mr. Diaconis serves as Special Counsel to the Firm of Rutherford & Christie, LLP in New York. Before joining that Firm, he was Vice-President and Claims Counsel of Hartford Financial Services Group, Inc., with responsibility for insurance company errors and omissions, commercial crime and reinsurance matters emanating from Hartford Financial Products. Prior to that, he was a partner in Peterson & Ross (1996-1999) and Wilson, Elser, Moskowitz, Edelman & Dicker (1981-1995), counseling clients in the same areas of practice. From 1980 to 1981, he John S.. Diaconis in focus Joseph J. DeVito
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Page 3 and 4: 1 P A G E Editor’s Comments Insid
Page 5 and 6: 3 P A G E name because there was an
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Page 9 and 10: 7 P A G E bringing the total to 235
Page 11 and 12: 9 P A G E is reflected in Sunkist S
Page 13 and 14: 1 1 P A G E Court Intervention in S
Page 15 and 16: 1 3 P A G E reasoning to hold that
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Page 31 and 32: 2 9 P A G E including underwriting,
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Page 35 and 36: 3 3 P A G E Patrick J. O’Brien Pa
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Page 39 and 40: 3 7 P A G E Save the Date! ARIAS•
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Page 43 and 44: Complete information about ARIAS•

FIRST QUARTER 2005 VOLUME 12 NUMBER 1 - arias·us

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